


The Girl Who Played Russian Roulette

by Helloleonardmccoy



Category: Millennium Trilogy - Stieg Larsson
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-06
Updated: 2014-08-06
Packaged: 2018-02-12 00:41:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2089206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Helloleonardmccoy/pseuds/Helloleonardmccoy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>My continuation of the series</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wednesday, January 2

**Author's Note:**

> Brought over from FF.Net

**Part 1**

**Breast Ironing**

The practice of beating away or ironing girls' breasts at puberty. Approximately 26% of Cameroonian girls undergo these rather useless and painful attempts to get rid of their breasts to protect the from men's sexual interest. More importantly it is to protect the family's honor from taking a sting if something should happen to the young girl at the hands of a male suitor.

Cameroon has instituted a nationwide campaign against this practice and it is also criminalized the practice at least to some extent. If a medical doctor determines that damage has been caused to the breasts, the responsible party may be jailed up to three years.

**Chapter 1**

**Wednesday, January 2**

Lisbeth Salander had finally had enough. She slammed her book of mathematical equations down on her desk and trudged over to the door. She let the person ring the door a few more times before she finally answered it with a gruff, "What?!"

"Hello Lisbeth, am I interrupting something?"

Why was it that conversations with him always started this way. Hello Lisbeth, I brought bagels am I interrupting? Yes he always was interrupting.

She stood back from the door and he made his way inside putting down the bagels and coffee he had in hand. She shut the door muttering and took the seat opposite from him. Grabbing the sack she dove for which ever bagel she wanted. She ended up with two of the blueberry bagels and strawberry cream cheese and reached for a cup of coffee.

"Not that one." He said. "You like yours black, yeah? Monica has me taking mine with cream. Says its better for my health."

She scowled and took the other cup. Taking a large bite of her bagel she stared at him for a while. While it wasn't unusual for him to stop by her apartment every once and a while to make sure she was still alive, this was the third time this week and she was beginning to get cautious.

He saw her staring over the edge of her bagel and laughed which made her scowl more. "I know your wondering why I am here." He took his time to drag it out by getting a bagel out for himself. "I'm here Lisbeth, to offer you a job." He held up his hand before she could speak. "I know you already have your job for Milton but this would just be a part time thing. I have already discussed it with the others and they agree that your talent is what we need."

She took a bite of her bagel and rolled the thought around her head. She would be working at Millennium, under Mikael. He would be able to keep a closer eye on her like he know doubt wanted, but what would she get out of it.

"What would I be doing?" She finally looked up at him after rolling her thoughts around in her head. No point in jumping ahead of herself until she knew what she would even be doing.

"You would be doing background checks on anyone we couldn't get information on ourselves. We can do a certain amount of digging but your skills far surpass our own. You would be getting the information that the masses want to read and the money moguls don't want us knowing about. Like with Wennerstrom."

She had, in the past, helped Blomkvist out with a money tycoon named Erik Wennerstrom when he had set up a trap for Blomkvist to go to jail for libel. On her own before meeting Blomkvist, she had already dug up enough information to put him away for a while but when she dug deeper she was able to set up a trap of her own and end up with all of Wennerstrom's money. Mikael had found out how she had done it but hadn't told a single soul besides Erika fucking Berger. The thought of working with her was almost enough to say no.

She did an assessment of why she should and shouldn't take this job. Did she need money? No. Would the affiliation with the magazine look good if she ever decided to switch jobs? Depended on what job she wanted to take. Was she getting very much work done at Milton since she came back. No, not as much as she would have liked. Only small cases here and there. It was like Armansky was still punishing her for leaving without telling him and for not telling him of her past.

All of her past was now at everyone's disposal thanks to the trial that had happened Last July. She hated not having anything to hide behind now, not that she was ever really hiding. But it was different having everyone now know the personal details of her life. The only good that had come of it was that she wasn't in jail and it had brought her and Mimi closer together. She had finally called her to see when she was coming back from Paris. In a few weeks she had went to pick her up when her plane touched down and they spent a week in her apartment only coming out to get food or cigarettes.

Though Lisbeth had told her she wasn't in love with her, she wasn't she what she was feeling anymore. She knew that she lusted after her greatly, but she didn't know if it was more that she was feeling. They had spent a great deal of time together now that she was back. After almost lossing her Lisbeth realized she needed to come out of her shell a little bit more and start seeing people more often.

Whether she really wanted to or not that seemed to happen quite a bit with Blomkvist. Just like now he felt it his right to come visit her whenever he got a wild hair up his arse. But he wasn't the only one she was seeing more often. Dargan called more and she made more visits to Palmgren. Normally she went every Sunday to visit Palmgren and play chess and talk about the latest news in the paper. He had taken to reading Millennium recently which Blomkvist had gotten for him free.

Finally the thought crossed her mind which really sold her for the idea. Did she want to dig in more bastards lives that probably deserved it?

"When do I start?"

 


	2. Saturday, January 12

**Chapter 2**

**Saturday, January 12**

Her cigarette lay smoking on the ash tray at her feet. She stared out the window, that was open a crack letting in the cold night air. She was in her underwear with only a tshirt on, but she was still rather warm. She had taken her temperature but it said she was normal. She felt like she was boiling inside and she didn't know how to let it out.

She picked up her cigarette and took the last few puffs. She decided to let it go out the window and watch it fall. When the embers hit the sidewalk she got up and walked over to her mobile. It was four in the morning but he would pick up, he always did.

"Hello?" A sleepy voice came on the other end.

She was silent for a long time but he knew right away it was her.

"Lisbeth? Whats wrong?" It sounded like he sat up in bed and turned a light on.

"I found my sister." It was his turn to be silent for a moment. "Annika had been threatening me with mounds of paperwork if I couldn't find her to sign off on her half of the estate, and I got to digging around for any clue I could find of her whereabouts."

"And you found her? My God Lisbeth, what cant you do with that computer of yours?" He said it joking, but she had a feeling that he really meant it. "Well where is she?"

"The last place that I have her at is in the United States in Maryland. That's where the trail goes cold." She started pacing in her room, tapping her finger against her phone.

"I'll start packing right away." She could hear him get up out of bed and start rummaging through his closet.

"Your not coming. I'm not even sure if I'm going. I'll probably just give the information to Annika so she can find her and get what she needs."

"Lisbeth, this is your sister. Don't you want to be the one to track her down?"

"I don't know Mikael. I don't see the point in me even seeing her." She sat down on the bed with her head in her hands. Why drag up all that past again when all she wanted to do was leave it dead.

"This is your chance to settle things. I'll come with you."

"If I go. it will be alone. You can't just drop everything anytime something comes up in my life, Mikael. You'll get fired." She said the last part joking, but she was serious about the rest. He couldn't just drop everything for her. They weren't in love or together and while friends did stuff with you they didn't just drop everything for you in a second. She had to set up some boundaries or else he would be a none stop force in her life. She didn't need that.

"No matter what you say I'm going if you are. If you try to leave me I will just follow you on a plane." He made a throat clearing noise. "Look this will probably be hard on you seeing her again and you'll need someone there with you. Can't you let that someone be me? Listen, lets meet for coffee around two to talk about it."

She finally agreed to meet up for coffee but she was sure that she wasn't going to give in to letting him come with her if she decided to go.

She walked the few blocks from her apartment to the coffee shop on the corner of the street. It was snowing out and she had her hood up and scarf rapped around her face. She wondered if the states would be warmer.

She crossed the street, dodging cars to head into the warm little coffee shop. He was already seated with his back to her and two coffees on the table. Hers would be black and his with cream.

She trudged up to her seat and pulled it out but didn't sit. "Your not coming.' She said finally. "Just because I showed up doesn't mean that I'm going either."

He held his hands up in defense. "Lets just sit and talk about our options first." He pointed at her coffee. "Still taking it black?"

She just nodded and finally sat. Her hands wrapped around her mug and she took a cautionary sip. He must have been there a while because it was cool enough to drink.

She dug in her bag and pulled out the little bit of paper work she could find on her sister. "She's going by a completely different name now so it was hard to find her. I had to drive around the spots she was last seen at and ask around to get that little bit of information. Its not a legal name change so that's why we haven't been able to find her. She must have stolen someone elses identification and took over their life."

Blomkvist chuckled. "Sounds familiar."

Salander glared at him and continued. "She jumped from place to place leaving very little paper trail. As I said the last place that I put her at is Maryland in the states."

Blomkvist rubbed his chin in thought. "The only reason she would change her name illegally is if she was running from someone. She wasn't in bad with Zala was she? And she didn't know what you did for a living?"

"As far as she was concerned Zala walked on water and I never spoke to her after that so no she wouldn't know what I did for a living. She must have gotten into trouble on her own and decided to escape the only way she knew how."

Blomkvist studied Salander for a while. She was saying this all like she was giving a report to Milton. No feeling, no real emotion. It was like her sister didn't matter to her either way. It was just another job to be done. He could see her being mad about the Zala incident but it was like Salander was an island that couldn't be moved. She handled things in stride and like they were a job to be completed and forgot about.

"What will you do when you find her?"

She shrugged. "Give her the paperwork and walk away. I'm not in her life and she doesn't need to be in mine. I have lived without knowing her so far and it doesn't seem like I've missed out."

There he had it. It was that easy for her to cut people out of her life. He wondered if he hadn't pushed so hard to be in it, would she have cut him out of it too. Possibly. She was already trying when the Zala scandal popped up. If she hadn't needed his help he would still probably be visiting her old apartment and wondering what he had done to deserve the cold treatment. Now he knew though.

Annika had let it slip one night after a hard case and one too many glasses of wine. Lisbeth had fallen for him like all his other hapless victims but she wasn't one to just take it lying down. She had been trying to exercise him out of her life and had been doing a pretty good job of it too. It had surprised him when Annika had let it slip. Lisbeth seemed the type to keep everyone at a distance and for her to like and trust him that much to have feelings for him was an honor. One that he had apparently screwed up somehow.

He didn't want her to go back to liking him since that always ended badly for both parties, but he did want her trust and friendship. He had been working hard at getting that back since the day she had stopped speaking to him. The only way he could see this happening was by forcing his way into her life any way he could.

This case was no different. She would need moral support. No matter how she said she felt about her sister it would probably still open old wounds. He wanted to be the one to be there if she needed someone. He wanted to be the person she turned to if she needed anything.

"So are you going to find her yourself?"

"I tried to drop the papers off at Annika's but she said she was way to swamped to handle it. She suggested that she could pay me to do it for her as a freelance thing, and I accepted."

"Good because I'm already packed."


End file.
